Just In Case! If You Are On Facebook It’s Time To Review Your Privacy Settings

Yesterday Facebook made an announcement that I don’t think any of us were expecting, the introduction of Graph Search.  A great new way to search for information you want to know about your friends.  For instance, now you can see who has traveled overseas by typing in the phrase, “friends who have traveled overseas”, and if your friends have shared their overseas travel their information will come up.  Pretty cool, right?

This is a great tool, that gives you access to tons of great information, BUT there are some things you should consider.  How much information do you currently have available via Facebook.  If your privacy settings, are too loose you maybe sharing way more than you think.  Facebook will be prompting it’s users to adjust privacy settings, and no matter what you have picked it’s probably not a bad idea to take a second look..  Facebook is going to make it very easy to find information about you, but only if you have made that information public already so you do need to pay closer attention to what you share and who shares your content.  If you use Foursquare, and it’s hooked into your Facebook account all of your travels could be up for grabs and easily accessible.

Remember that it is not just you!  This change is not just about you, it will also effect you if your friends tag you in a picture.  For instance, if you have a friend who loves to tag you in all of the pictures that you take together, who then decides to post them on Facebook.  They could end up in Graph Search’s as well, so you need to make sure that you pay attention to the pictures you are tagged in, and you may want to adjust your settings to make tagging you in pictures more difficult, or at least something you need to review.

Graph Search, is a great tool and will be helpful in a number of ways, but it is better to exercise some caution than it is to find yourself overexposed, or uncomfortable that you let too much information out of the bag.  Remember what happens on the Internet, stays on the Internet so your margin for error is very small.  You don’t want to find out to late that you shared to much and now that information makes it difficult for you to get a job, or a raise, or puts your safety in jeopardy.  You should review your information this way, think about how you would feel if your most recent post showed up on Channel 6 News, if you don’t feel comfortable with it there you may not want to put it on the Internet.  Take a look at your privacy settings over the next couple of weeks, it’s better to be safe, then sorry!